Rick Florino of Artist Direct recently spoke with ROB ZOMBIE about his forthcoming film The Lords Of Salem, as well as his new album that he will begin work on in June. An excerpt follows:

The characters in your movies are always so vibrant. When you're making a film, do the characters dictate the action?

"Yeah, definitely! For the most part, if the characters are interesting, the audience will watch them. You want to give them something interesting to do, of course. A lot of times, I find if I get bored with a movie, I'm just bored with the characters that are onscreen. Nothing is worse than when you're watching a movie and you've got four characters that basically look and talk the same. You start asking, 'Wait, which guy is that?' I think defining the characters is probably the most important thing you can do."

Did The Lords Of Salem start with the characters?

"Nothing ever really starts with the characters. Usually, I have a basic idea for something. It's a thin idea you can explain in two lines like, 'What if this happened?' From there, the characters start to emerge. It takes a while to define them. You don't fully define them until you start casting. For me, that's when it starts getting fun because you can really define people and separate them from each other. It really comes to life."

Is this new record going to be another heavy one?

"Yeah, that's what we're going to do. Usually, we don't really have a focus when we make a record. We go in and start writing songs, and it goes where it's going to go. We let it go that way. This time, we sort of made a pack that we're going to make a heavy record on purpose and stick to that goal. We have been. We have a lot of songs that aren't 100 percent finished but they're pretty far along. We just want to make a dark, heavy, weird record and stick to that idea. If something comes up that isn't, we won't finish it. We'll stick to the plan. You may say that when you start recording. Then other songs start happening that don't really fit that and you go with it. This time, we're really going to stay on task."

Lyrically, will everything weave together?

"I haven't even really started them yet it's so early in the process. I don't really get into the lyrical part of the record until the songs are fairly far along. I never have. It's always the way I've done it for some reason."

To read the interview in its entirety, click here.

In live news, Rob Zombie and MEGADETH will embark on a co-headlining tour next month. Confirmed dates are as follows:

May

11 - Holmdel, NJ - PNC Bank Arts Center
12 - Scranton, PA - Toyota Pavilion
13 - Columbia, MD - Merriweather Post Pavilion
16 - Pittsburgh, PA - Stage AE
18 - Grand Rapids, MI - The Deltaplex
19 - St. Louis, MO - Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre
20 - Columbus, OH - Rock On The Range
22 - La Crosse, WI - La Crosse Center
24 - Sioux City, IA - Tyson Center
25 - Wichita, KS - Hartman Arena
26 - Pryor, OK - Rocklahoma